J.V. Rebels piling up victories

W.R. Myers Rebels junior varsity girls rugby team earned two more wins on their home field this past week to continue its forward momentum from an undefeated tournament the previous weekend.

Last Tuesday, in league competition, the junior varsity Rebels blanked Winston Churchill 38-0 at Ken McDonald Memorial Sports Park.

“Our defensive line, I can’t say enough. There are still things we need to improve on in our defensive line, but the girls are getting better all the time,” said Andrew Llewelyn-Jones, head coach of the W.R. Myers Rebels junior varsity girls rugby team. “They are moving fast up on the opposition not allowing them to get their running game going and we saw that in the tournament last weekend and once again against Winston Churchill. They move up fast, they make the most of their tackles and that’s an offensive defence is what I call it. It causes the other team to make mistakes and then we capitalize on those mistakes. The ball handling of the Rebels was very good, the continuity was excellent with a very good result against a very strong Winston side.”

The varsity team had a tough go of it as Winston Churchill returned the favour with a 48-0 victory over the Rebels.

“The senior girls fought very well. Winston had a player on their team that scored four of their tries. The girls tackled well, they fought hard,” said Llewelyn-Jones. “Winston went up by one try and the Rebels fought back to get close to their line and then they made a pass a couple of metres from their line and it was intercepted and she ran the whole field for the score. I think their heads dropped a little bit after that because they thought it was an uphill battle from there and the game got away from them. But, overall, Winston was better on the day and that’s just the way it goes.”

The Rebels also had an exhibition match at Ken McDonald Memorial Sports Park last Thursday against Eagle Butte, and Myers demolished the opposition by scoring 90-plus points. Eagle Butte had a sprinkling of Grade 11 and 12 players, but decided to trot out the junior varsity team against them in the developmental game.

“Our ball handling was superb. The continuity, they were handling well, they were creating the overlap and they were experimenting. This was an opportunity for the JVs to work on a few of the moves we were doing in practice and they executed very well,” said Llewelyn-Jones.

Rebels played their last league games of the year at home on Tuesday against LCI with results unavailable at press time.

“It will be a tough game for both sides. LCI is doing quite well in the league this year, but there’s no reason the senior varsity girls can give LCI a very good game. If they get their confidence back up, they can more than hold their own,” said Llewelyn-Jones. “The juniors, LCI is probably the best JV side out there, we haven’t played them yet. We’ll see how it goes as we look to build on the momentum we have.”

After Tuesday’s match, the varsity Rebels will be heading off to zones where their opponent will be determined based on final league results. Junior varsity Rebels will wrap up their season with a tournament on May 24 in Medicine Hat.